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DEAN MCNULTY, QMI Agency

MONTREAL — The engine that powered a third of Formula One’s grid on Sunday at the Canadian Grand Prix could be on the streets of Toronto and Edmonton by 2012 for the Honda Indys.

And it could even be in the endurance racing sports cars of the American Le Mans Series at Mosport International Raceway by next season.

In an exclusive interview with the Toronto Sun, Cosworth general manager Mark Gallagher said Sunday that it is the goal of his company to be building race engines for a number of North American racing series with the next year.

“We would love to be putting our Cosworth engines into the IZOD IndyCars series and the American le Mans Series,” Gallagher said.

IndyCar bosses are already looking at bringing in a new chassis for the 2012 series to replace the current Dallaras that have been the mainstay of open-wheel racing’s top North American loop for almost a decade.

And it has been rumoured that the parent Indy Racing League could announce soon that it will open IndyCar racing to competing engine builders at that time as well.

Honda has been the lone engine supplier in the series since Toyota switched its emphasis from open wheel to NASCAR racing after the 2005 season.

“I don’t want to give too much away,” Gallagher said. “But we already have the facilities and the manufacturing capabilities in our U.S. plants to make this happen.”

Cosworth currently builds engines for the Williams, Lotus, HRT and Virgin F-1 teams.

This season marked Cosworth’s return to F-1 after a three-year absence and it is competing against the big-budget boys from Mercedes, Ferrari and Renault.

But Gallagher said that he dislikes the David vs Goliath analogy because Cosworth has been in the business of making horse power for nearly half a century.

“Don’t forget that for 40 years — up until 2004 — we were owned by Ford and that left the company with a great legacy of manufacturing,” he said. “And because of the kinds of facilities we inherited, we can build a much more affordable engine.”

Gallagher said that what might cost a Ferrari or a Mercedes $10 million US to develop an engine, Cosworth can do it for a fraction of that.

“We have a small, but dedicated staff of engineers and mechanics who are second to none in their abilities to build fast, reliable and affordable engines,” he said.

It is that fact which makes Cosworth a real candidate to be part of any new engine program that IndyCar might consider.

Also a big plus for the Cosworth efforts to make it back into North American racing is that the company’s co-owners — Kevin Kalkhoven and Gerald Forsythe — are both based in the U.S. and Kalkhoven is a partner in KV Racing Technology — team that has two cars in the IZOD IndyCar series and will have Canada’s Paul Tracy in one of their Dallaras in both Toronto and Edmonton this season.

Notes

Red Bull’s Mark Webber, who sat on top of the Formula One point parade at the start of the Canadian Grand Prix on Sunday, lost his perch before the race had even begun.

Even though Webber had qualified second to race winner Lewis Hamilton, he was bumped down to seventh place after the team changed the gearbox on his car.

Although he appeared to recover after Hamilton was forced to make a quick pit stop just eight laps in, Webber soon found himself on the outside looking in and ended up with a fifth-place finish.

That dropped Webber to third in the standings and allowed both Hamilton and his McLaren teammate Jenson Button to leapfrog the Australian in the points.

Low definition

Formula One televised races always have been ahead of the curve when it comes to new technology to make the races more exciting for the fans watching at home.

But F-1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone is dragging his feet when it comes to delivering his sport in high definition.

He said at the Canadian Grand Prix on Sunday that it might be 2012 before his series will be broadcast in high def.

Ecclestone seems to think there is not enough demand to have the series available in HD.

“We don’t want to broadcast unless people want it,” Ecclestone told Autosport magazine. “I asked in England, the BBC, about it — how many people can receive it? They said about 20% of the viewers who watch F-1.

“Then I want to make sure that what we produce is top quality. Before we start seeing the top-top quality that we want, I would say it will probably be 2012 before we can guarantee it.”

Same old Schu

Seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher made a career out of giving no quarters on the race track and on Sunday he showed he still has at least semblance of that fire in his belly.

Just four laps from the end of the Canadian GP, Ferrari driver Filipe Massa attempted to pass Schumacher’s Mercedes but when he moved to go around the slower German, Schumacher turned his car into the Ferrari sending Massa into the grass damaging his front wing.

To many in he crowd, it brought back memories of Schumacher’s kamikaze attempt to derail Canada’s Jacques Villeneuve’s championship drive in 1997 at Jerez.

Only this time, Schumacher was fighting for 10th place and not first place.